A study of the prescribing pattern of antimicrobial agents in a Tertiary care teaching hospital of Andaman & Nicobar Island

Background and Objectives: Antimicrobial agents are one of the greatest discoveries in recent times, and are also being used somewhat irrationally for various diseased states. It has lead to the development of resistance; increase in the number of Adverse Drug Reactions (ADRs), also the health of the patient is being compromised especially when antibiotics are prescribed irrationally. This study was done with the aim of assessing the antibiotics usage in a tertiary care teaching hospital in Port Blair, Andaman & Nicobar Island.Materials & method: Auditing of the prescription from various clinical departments was done over a period of 8 months, from August 2016 to March 2017was done to assess the use of antimicrobials. Total 3852 prescriptions were analyzed for average number of drugs prescribed, antimicrobials prescribed by generic name or brand name, percentage of antibiotics among the prescribed drugs. And the data was analyzed in percentage and proportions.Observations: A total of 3852 prescriptions from the Outdoor Patient Department of the hospital were analyzed in this study and out of those patients, male patients were 2000(51.9%) and female patients were 1852(48.1%) with male: female ratio of 1.07:1. The most common age group which was prescribed antibiotics was 21-40 years, followed by 1-20 years age group. Out of the 3852 prescriptions, 2360(61%) patients were prescribed 2 drugs in the prescription, followed by 1120(29%) patients with 3 drugs in a prescription. Generic name of the drugs was used in 2910(75.5%) prescriptions and brand name in 942(24.5%) prescriptions. 1698(44%) prescriptions containing antibiotics were prescribed empirically on the basis of provisional diagnosis. Amoxicillin- Clavulanic acid was prescribed in 1437(37%) patients, followed by Azithromycin in 862(22%) patients.Conclusion: Stress must be laid towards the rational use of Antibiotics before its too late as already there is worldwide emergence of antibacterial resistance, moreover the irrational use of antibiotics is increasing side effects and total cost of treatment as well.